Hello again.I sincerely hope that all our talk of chocolate chip cookies hasn't left you in a sugar coma, because I come to you today with more sweets. Some of you are going to hate me for this, I know, but I had to. I didn't have a choice. This past Saturday evening, a reader of this website sent me an e-mail with the subject line, "Looking for Good Pie Crust." And get this: I happened to have an...

So, how many of you, after reading last week's food section of The New York Times, made a batch of chocolate chip cookies? I can't possibly be the only one susceptible to suggestion around here. Hands up, now. Don't be shy.Okay, so, for those of you who made the cookies, how many ate them at every meal for multiple days, to the near-complete exclusion of other foods? I ask not only because I did, b...

I regret to inform you that we have now reached, it seems, the time of year when I can hardly motivate to cook a single thing. Uh oh.Maybe you know the feeling? I hope so. For me, the problem is not so much the heat, although that's certainly part of it. Here in Seattle, it only occasionally gets too hot for the stove, but when it does, it's memorable. Last week, I was working on developing a recip...

Apparently, I am a little bit fickle. Only three short months ago, almost to the day, I was singing the praises of homemade mayonnaise, and now here I am, about to offer you a recipe for basil aioli made by doctoring a jar of Best Foods. This might be a good time, I think, to call into service my favorite Walt Whitman quote:Do I contradict myself?Very well then, I contradict myself,(I am large, I h...

I love having house guests. It has been brought to my attention that this is perhaps not a very common or popular stance, but I am sticking by it. As a general concept, I think house guests are pretty great. It's like having a slumber party, only you can cuss without getting in trouble, and the mean girl from second grade isn't around to make you cry anymore, and instead of Dr. Pepper and Funyuns,...